TOKYO (TR) – Police have arrested a 29-year-old man for allegedly stalking and harassing a female pedestrian in Machida City under the guise of being a nightlife scout, reports Nippon News Network (Apr. 20).
Seiji Hidaka, an unemployed resident of Sagamihara City, Kanagawa Prefecture, was taken into custody on April 16, according to Tokyo Metropolitan Police.
At around 7:30 p.m., Hidaka persistently followed a woman for approximately 40 meters through the bustling entertainment district near JR Machida Station. During the pursuit, he repeatedly attempted to solicit her by calling out, “I’m a scout.”
During police questioning, Hidaka denied the allegations of malicious scouting. “The purpose of talking to her was to pick her up,” the suspect told investigators, claiming it was simply an attempt at nanpa (hitting on women).
The arrest comes amid an aggressive crackdown by the Metropolitan Police Department on illegal touting and malicious scouting in Tokyo’s major entertainment hubs, including Shinjuku Ward’s Kabukicho and Machida.
Authorities suspect that many of these street-level nuisance operations are directly tied to tokuryu groups, which are anonymous crime syndicates that communicate via smartphone apps.
In a concerted effort to clean up the streets, police apprehended two individuals for malicious scouting and seven others for illegal touting in the capital just last week, with authorities vowing to continue tightening enforcement against such activities.
